Micko Has Spoken

Legendary Kerryman Mick O'Dwyer has announced the provincial champs system is Poopie and wants an open draw. We've covered this before a wee bit and its probably safe to say we all agree with him, But is an open draw the best alternative, should players after everything they put in be only awarded with one/two games if they get knocked out early on. Would a uefa champs league format be better? If the final decision lay with you, how would you reform the championship?

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lets do it.

The players give so much of themselves right now, I don't know if it is fair to ask them to do more at a consistently high intensity like a champions league format.

I would have a seeded draw in rd1 with a secondary competition for first round losers.

champions league idea is worst idea just think of the dead rubber end of group mathes leitrim v cavan playing for third in the group who would watch that atleast the qualifers are knockout teams have something to play for. if the cl format was in this year would the quarter final teams be any different? maybe limerick for down.

atleast straight knockout home and away with an aggerate system for the first and second round you wouldnt have a poor match you would always have the 2nd day to sort out the mistakes of the first and every team having two matches home and away would mean no team could complain about advantages etc.

Ooops, I meant to say a fifa world cup one not a ucl format. Patrick, thats why you'd have qualifiers before groups stages to avoid dead rubber games. Well dosen't really matter, anything that dosen't seem too anti-ulster or anti-tyrone will do- I'd have a single knockout comp with seeded teams (based on the previous years performance), wee counties have the first couple of rounds with everyone else joining after round 2/3. Might make two legged ties for QF's and SF's.

A secondary comp for losers is a good idea, so its not meaningless it could be made to affect the next seasons seeds. Come to think of it, what happened to tommy murphy?

so a seeded knockout rd div 1&2 v 3&4 or a new seeding system winners go into 4 groups of four good idea.

any change wouldnt be anti ulster if anything it would be pro ulster cant see a change though just cant see cork and kerry giving up their easy run to the quarters.

tommy murphy cup if anything gave antrim and wicklow experinece and a final in croke park and antrim made the ulster final and wicklow have had runs in the qualifers gaa do make strange decisions at times.

Please stop the rubbish.
every provincial winner gets a 1/4 final spot.

The cheek of it, coming from a Tyrone man whose side are one step off the 1/4 finals by beating the grand total of nothing.

thought we beat a divison one team armagh? i wouldnt call them nothing.

youve set the bar really high if you consider a team like armagh rubbish very disrespectful or maybe its because youve worked out brolly is right.

So your point is absolutely null and void, we beat a division 1 team in Down. Last years all ireland finalists. A team that finished higher in division 1 than Armagh, so using your own logic, Cork had a more difficult path to the quarter finals.

Way to destroy your own argument.

Armagh were rubbish, and you are only fooling yourself if you believe otherwise. they needed two goes at a division 4 side. I suppose you'll be the greatest thing in the world when you get past another team operating in division 4 this year.

so outside the best 4 teams in the country everyone else is rubbish.

so going by your logic you could only beat a rubbish team by a point to win the all-ireland.

i hope cork's injury problems are sorted by the semis to prove without the excuses of injurys etc if they are the best or not.

no donegal are the ulster champions were just a team comming through the back door we aint big headed when we get on the top we respect all around us.

Ok, so don't go by my logic, go by yours.
tyrone have had an easier ride this year.

rubbish you are not big headed. Tyrone think they invented the game as evidenced by your constant "we have kerrys number" diatribe. this team of the (last) decade nonsense should be put to bed.

armagh were useless. they'll tell you as much.

iv never heard anyone in tyrone say we invented the game mickey harte created a style of play not the game itself.

if cork beat kerry in croke park we would never hear the end of it.

it was so easy we were told we were going to lose every round.

patrick91 wrote:cant see cork and kerry giving up their easy run to the quarters.

Don't think so Patrick. True Munster is dominated by the two teams but only one gets to the QF's immediately. The other one, this year Cork, have to slug it out in the qualifiers. That logic also stinks of hypocrisy, need you be reminded of which two teams who between 1999 and 2010 totally dominated your province.

patrick91 wrote:we were told we were going to lose every round.

Who by? The big bad anti-tyrone media of the south?

Nice to see the Cork man immediately looking for a "seeded" draw.
Maybe we need to get Sepp Blatter involved.......................

Patrick,
There is only so long you can keep up this "everyone's against us" stuff!!
Although i couldnt support a team with the odious Ryan McMenemin on it. Surely even his team mated hate him??

John Cregan wrote:Nice to see the Cork man immediately looking for a "seeded" draw.
Maybe we need to get Sepp Blatter involved.......................

I only opted for the seeded draw in round 1 to allow for a competitive secondary competition.
from a cork perspective, I'd take my chances in an open draw.

You could still get a tough enough draw from teams comprised of divs 3&4. It also makes promotion to div 2 even more attractive.
If you did it on the basis of 1 v 4 and 2 v 3.

34 counties in the competition.

the 2 teams at the bottom of div 4 take a trip to NY to play 2 games against each other and NY to make up a 32 county competition.

even the worst side of the 34 gets a minimum of 2 games.

It means getting into div 1 is more important and it means staying out of the bottom 2 in div 4 is more important, it makes the league in general more important.

IMO it would be great for the game if they were to scrap the provincial title's and give everyone the same crack at it. If anything it's a disadvantage to win your provincial title theese day's.

with my Limerick hat on we are top 8 in championship and division 4 in the league. A "seeded" open draw would have to take account of both positions with Championship position surely to take precedence..................

if you put a 6-7 year deadline on teams to reach their level, then it shouldn't be a problem.

I take the point though. the league has only just been revamped a couple of years back so I don't think all the teams have found their level just yet.

Why not tie the league in with the championship. Have 4 groups of 8 - home and away games. Only the top 4 from each group qualify to play in the championship. The advantages - the league becomes very important and all teams get at least 14 games. The All-Ireland Final is game 18. Problem solved. Same for the hurling, smaller format - only 2 groups of 6 or 7.



Seriously though, when someone like Micko favours the abolition of the provincials, it's time for discussions on alternative.

I agree 100% with the abolition of the Provincials....................

I came up with a similar idea a while ago as another alternative bluemoda. Only instead of having 4 groups of 8 each province would replace the league divisions with counties playing teams outwith their province as well. That way each county gets slightly more games and we have an open draw while still retaining some sort of provincial element at the same time.

On Hurling its a wee bit different. The geographical spread of strong hurling counties is more scattered to that in football so the situation we have now is that we've got the likes of Galway and Antrim moving into Leinster. Hurling needs more of a revamp than football does I think- for that we should keep different tiers like we have now except scrap the provincial element. Different divisions with promotion and relegation to provide a wee bit more mobility for smaller counties as they improve or decline.

creating a group stage would greatly disadvantage the smaller counties unlike the current system which can produce div 4 quarter finalists.

but a group stage would take away the one thing that makes gaa great the raw emotion of the championship where shocks can happen and the dream of croke park can come true.

a group stage this year would have led to boring dead rubber matches until this week and we would have lost out on limerick's heroic run the munster final london first win in 34 years and the qualifer shocks would contunie to happen.

micko is a legend and has upmost respect but scraping a system which brings so much emotion and delight for a group stage is wrong and anyway 3 provincal champions (hope it stays 3) in the semi finals goes against any change.

Gaelic-Warrior wrote:I came up with a similar idea a while ago as another alternative bluemoda. Only instead of having 4 groups of 8 each province would replace the league divisions with counties playing teams outwith their province as well. That way each county gets slightly more games and we have an open draw while still retaining some sort of provincial element at the same time.

On Hurling its a wee bit different. The geographical spread of strong hurling counties is more scattered to that in football so the situation we have now is that we've got the likes of Galway and Antrim moving into Leinster. Hurling needs more of a revamp than football does I think- for that we should keep different tiers like we have now except scrap the provincial element. Different divisions with promotion and relegation to provide a wee bit more mobility for smaller counties as they improve or decline.

Doesn't this descrbe the league as it currently stands?



I must admit that moving Galway and Antrim to Leinster doesn't sit with me. Galway is in Connacht and Antrim is in Ulster, always were and always will be. Don't mess with the ancient provinces. I still stand by the league home-and-away format, for hurling especially. I believe such a format will move the game forward. You could also have lower divisions with promotion and relegation.

bluemoda wrote:Doesn't this describe the league as it currently stands?

No. Like you're idea mine has both a league home-and-away part before the all-ireland finals. Counties will play each other from all over the country but league points will be earned for wins and added to their total in a provincial league, fixtures can be done up to protect trad provincial derbies. That way you get provincial champions from an open draw and a certain amount of teams from each province going into the AI series with provincial champs seeded higher.